Terminal Rage (15 page)

“Such as?”

“Trusts, partnerships, and even phantom individual owners, like real Egyptian citizens who were dead, detained, or worse.”

“How were they purchased, though?” Wagner pushed on.

“Through different lawyers, law firms or realtors—never using the same one twice. We believe they created this monster structure without a head, comprised of disconnected cells, which makes it impossible to trace.”

Ingenious, Mourad thought. But then again, criminals usually are.

“We know this from an insider who
’
s seeking immunity.” Harby flipped through his memo to get to the last pages. His big reveal, no doubt.

“This informer also gave us a copy of an advanced software application called Leviathan that can unlock this entire thing. It
’
s highly sophisticated and like nothing we have ever seen before. Definitely not developed in this country. Not only does it provide the details of each purchase, but information on how to liquidate each property and cash in anonymously. Unfortunately it
’
s password protected and encrypted.”

Ambassador Wagner tapped his fingernails on the table. His eyes narrowed to an intense focus that betrayed his growing frustration with the Egyptians. “Let me guess—you want us to help you crack this Leviathan
thing?”

Harby
’
s eyes glimmered as he traded knowing looks with General Farag before turning to address the Americans once again. “Do you by any chance happen to know a man called Danny Zimmerman?”

Wagner ran his hand through his hair and shrugged his shoulders. Simmer clasped a hand to his chest and bit his lips before shaking his head unconvincingly.

“He
’
s an American-Israeli hacker turned code-breaker. He consulted for the Mossad in the nineties before he was lured by the NSA to work full-time for them. Our information technology experts tell me if there is anyone in the world who can break into Leviathan, it
’
s that man. And because of his value as one of the world
’
s top code breakers, the NSA keeps Zimmerman on a tight leash and doesn
’
t like to share him much.”

Mourad
’
s stomach hardened and his throat tightened at the sight of Harby
’
s mouth moving and the neat memo he had read from. These generals had no clue how strategic alliances were nurtured. They must have a whole catalogue of favors they wanted to extort from Uncle Sam, ready for an opportunity like today when the Americans were desperate and ready to barter. Highway robbers in uniform, is what they really are.

Farag puffed out his chest and smiled with approval at Harby. He motioned for him to stop talking. If he really was a good dog, now would have been the time for a pat on the head.

“Ambassador Wagner, I need to consult with the Field Marshal first. But let
’
s say I am able to convince him to authorize the immediate release of these two Jordanian terrorists. Can you give us your word your government will loan us Danny Zimmerman to help us unlock this software? And that you
’
ll not interfere with our liquidation and repatriation of those assets?”

Wagner rolled up his sleeves and dug out his phone from his pocket. “General, is there a private room nearby I can use for a few minutes to discuss this with my superiors? The director of national security runs the NSA, but he serves at the pleasure of the president. I don
’
t see why this would be a problem, but I don
’
t know how the NSA operates. As for what happens if and when Leviathan is cracked—if as you say liquidation can happen invisibly and behind the scenes—then I see no reason for the Justice Department or the Treasury to interfere with this.”

Wagner and Farag got up and disappeared to adjacent private rooms to report to their respective masters. Mourad needed another cup of sweet coffee to help him digest what he had just heard. His thoughts were focused on William Price and how a Republican Senator could command so much influence amidst one of the most acrimonious political seasons between the two major parties in that country.

Finn Simmer was standing right behind him as the remaining three generals in the room broke out in a side conversation in Arabic. “It
’
s Benny Marino—our deputy director, in case you
’
re wondering. He
’
s a lifelong friend of Senator Price. Marino
’
s influence extends beyond the FBI. It partially explains the level of traction this whole thing is attracting.” Simmer had read his mind.

“Benny is a good friend to have. But is he powerful enough to mobilize the president and the secretary of state to do all of this—to get the US to bargain with terrorists? I wonder what other excellent cards Senator Price is holding close to his chest to make him such a valued customer.”

“Well, I did say partially. Let
’
s just say he and the White House see eye-to-eye on a number of strategic interests. Don
’
t quote me on this, but I would say Senator Price has a few other tentacles playing to his advantage besides his friendship with our deputy director.”

Wagner and Farag returned to the room at the same time, both smiling. They must have exchanged notes outside before coming in. Their respective bosses had just green-lighted the plan they had hatched. As a result of these brief telephone conversations, two convicted terrorists would walk free.

Mourad took a deep breath, not entirely sure how he felt about what he had just enabled.

FOURTEEN

Sunday, November 6, 2011—6:03 a.m.
Qena, Egypt

J
amie Smythe, the FBI special agent assigned to transfer the Jordanian prisoners to Italy, looked down from the Knighthawk helicopter at the godforsaken prison below. Located sixty-two miles northwest of the Upper Egyptian city of Qena, the
Zor el Shaytan
maximum security facility couldn
’
t have been named anything more suitable: The Devil
’
s Throat
.

Smythe was in his mid-thirties and lightly tanned. He wore a plain red baseball cap, a white linen shirt, and a pair of faded jeans. Sitting next to him in the chopper were four Delta Force operators in generic camouflaged fatigues. They had no badges, names, ranks, or anything to identify them. Also in the Knighthawk was the crew operating the helicopter.

Smythe had been in the Sinai for the last two weeks tracking an escaped New Jersey mobster sighted in one of the resort city
’
s casinos. He had made little progress and was ready to pack up and head back to DC when he was abruptly reassigned to extract two prisoners, Tarek Nabulsi and Hassan Madi, the two men convicted for the 2005 terrorist attacks in the very town he was in.

His mission was to escort them to Naples and safely exchange them for Julia Price, the kidnapped daughter of a heavy-weight American senator. Special Agent Liam Nishimura in New York and his boss in Cairo, Finn Simmer, had bombarded him with a torrent of photographs, FBI and CIA briefs and updates, and a slew of endless instructions.

Smythe was quite familiar with the prison. At least on paper. Some of the most dangerous Egyptian terrorists the FBI had helped ensnare now called it home. Studying up on the prison was standard curriculum for any field agent covering Egypt. When he first saw the satellite imagery of the penitentiary a few years ago, it had seemed like a cruel Photoshop hoax. Lodged between a merciless desert and parched, inhospitable hills where life didn’t dare grow, the prison’s fundamental feature of impenetrability was its impossible geographic placement.

The CIA
’
s briefing on The Devil
’
s Throat said it best. The isolation of the prisoners was so extreme that not one of its inmates was aware of the Egyptian people
’
s nine-months-old revolution against the tyrannical regime that had toppled their president of more than thirty years. The moment a prisoner was admitted, their knowledge of the outside world was frozen indefinitely. Books, television, and telephones were prohibited.

The prison was built in the middle of a desert valley surrounded by six rocky hillsides. There were a few pathways out of the valley, but only one led to the single road connecting the prison to the outside world. The other paths, carved by the army twenty-five years ago when the prison was being constructed, led nowhere. These false routes terminated as dead-end enclosures within the hills, and were also booby-trapped with land mines—explosives so powerful they didn
’
t just maim a human body, they liquefied it.

Anyone foolhardy enough to try escaping the prison would first have to know which path to take. Then they would have to survive the lethal deathstalker scorpions and desert horned vipers that infested the area. And if luck was on their side and they escaped these venomous creatures, there was also the matter of six heavily fortified checkpoints separated by electrified barbed wire. If they made it out of the prison, they would have no cover from the twelve elevated positions where snipers would pick them off like fish in a bucket.

Even in the inconceivable possibility they were able to escape the snipers
’
bullets and ran for their lives on the highway, then evaded capture by the prison patrols who owned the road for miles upon miles, they would eventually end up in uncharted deserts or more hills with no food or water. And before long, they would find themselves facing what they had tried to escape in the first place—a miserable death.

The Devil
’
s Throat was penitentiary purgatory. A final step before eternal damnation. Its four hundred inmates were all on death row for terrorism and other violent crimes. But the Egyptian state was not in a hurry to execute any of them, especially the prisoners who could still provide information critical to ongoing criminal investigations. The average lifespan of a prisoner before execution was seven to ten years. A few years ago, a handful of Western rights groups had complained to the Egyptian government about reports of prisoners in the Devil
’
s Throat who had been on death row for more than twenty years.
The atrocious conditions at the prison, it seemed, were a dress rehearsal for the hell that would come after the inmates were executed.

The Knighthawk carrying Smythe and the Delta Force men had flown across the Red Sea from the south camp of the Multinational Force and Observers in Sharm El Sheikh. The MFO is an international peacekeeping force overseeing the terms of the peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. The helicopter was ordinarily stationed at Task Force Sinai, the American contingent within the MFO, and had been borrowed by the FBI for this mission.

As it landed in the main courtyard of the prison, the golden rays of the waking sun bounced off the helicopter
’
s shiny belly, filling the ground with waves of light. The helicopter
’
s rotors and engine breached the depressing dead air of the penitentiary.

The Knighthawk offered a rare distraction for a few inmates who were roused out of their beds and spied through their minuscule windows overlooking the courtyard to see what was happening. Smythe couldn
’
t imagine the inmates were used to hearing anything else at this time of the day other than the screams of fellow prisoners being tortured.

Major General Omar Beltagi, a bald, obese man with a curled mustache and thick sideburns, stood in the middle of the courtyard. Smythe had studied his picture on his phone during the flight. Beltagi was flanked by a constellation of uniformed men, most of whom had donned their sunglasses to avoid the reflection off the chopper.

Finn Simmer had informed Smythe to expect high-level officers from the Ministry of Interior, the governor
’
s chief of staff and his men, a handful of army officers, and a four-man unit from Egypt
’
s elite counterterrorism force, Unit 777. The Egyptians stood at attention, waiting for Smythe and the other men to emerge from the aircraft.

If the CIA briefing Smythe had pored over during the flight was anything to go by, Warden Beltagi must have had a rude and early start to his day at his lodge in Qena about forty miles away. Beltagi had a habit of sleeping with pretty young girls from the nearby women
’
s prison.

In his ten years as warden, not one inmate had left the prison walls alive. Surely he must have been pissed to hear from whoever woke him this morning about SCAF
’
s decision to pardon not one, but two prisoners to be released into US custody.

When Smythe and the other men emerged from the helicopter, the Egyptian officers from Unit 777 recognized the Delta Force guys. The commanding officer of the American contingent had told Smythe on the flight that he and his unit had trained with the Egyptian Special Forces a few months ago in Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti. The terse mood in the courtyard was temporarily softened by the handshakes, hugs and warm smiles of the Special Forces fraternity. It left Smythe feeling a little left out.

“Major General Beltagi, I am Jamie Smythe, from the FBI. Have the prisoners been prepped for the transfer? ”

Beltagi looked at him with no expression on his face. Smythe remembered somewhere in the reams of reports and briefs a note saying the warden didn
’
t speak a word of English. A young, dark-skinned Egyptian army officer with a handsome face standing by Beltagi jumped to his rescue.

“Welcome to
Zor el Shaytan,
Mr. Smythe. My name is Major Adel Sobhy, with the Ministry of Defense. I am happy to translate for you.”

Smythe reached out to shake his hand.

Beltagi was focused as Sobhy paraphrased the question. In response, the warden explained that Nabulsi and Madi had been moved to a secure holding wing of the prison, but they had not be
en informed of what was about to happen. The two Jordanians were terrified, Beltagi revealed with a thundering laugh that rumbled through the courtyard. They thought their move to the secure holding wing was a precursor to execution. Sobhy did not translate the warden
’
s last observation, but Smythe understood anyway. He was almost fluent in Arabic, a skill he kept to himself, in the interest of the gold nuggets of secondary information provided by Egyptians who assumed he was just another dumb
khawaga
—foreigner.

The warden gave an order, and the group headed to the secure holding wing where Nabulsi and Madi had been transferred. Smythe walked with the Delta Force operators, who were a step behind the Egyptians.

As they entered the building, Smythe
’
s stomach tightened. If human misery and suffering could exude a unique smell, it would have been something close to the stench inside The Devil
’
s Throat. It wasn
’
t just the pheromones of the four hundred residents of the prison waiting to be killed that was responsible for the funk. The prison was notorious for its inhumane conditions. Its plumbing was decrepit. Smythe covered his mouth and nose to avoid the terrible smell. But it was going to take more than his hand to block the stench of unprocessed human waste he tasted on his tongue. His skin crawled and his throat tightened as he tried hard to keep his stomach contained. The Delta Force guys didn
’
t seem moved by any of that. They had probably smelled and experienced far worse in their time.

Two burly prison guards in riot gear stood vigil outside the room. When they saw Beltagi approaching, one of them shouted to his colleagues inside, alerting them of the incoming group. They waited for the all clear and then unbolted the doors.

Inside, the holding room was about a nine-hundred-square-foot open space that could be outfitted for any purpose. There were no windows, but powerful halogen flood lights suspended from the ceiling generated a tremendous amount of oppressive heat. Smythe was instantly uncomfortable.

In the center of the room, two prisoners wearing orange jumpsuits were shackled and tied to rusty metal chairs. Their heads were hooded with black cloth bags. When everyone had come in, the doors were bolted once again from the outside. Even though the Delta Force men at his side gave him some sense of security, Smythe couldn
’
t help but feel a little unnerved to be boxed in under the mercy of a man like Beltagi.

The warden transformed in the presence of his prisoners. The trace of decency he had feigned for Smythe in the courtyard all but disappeared. His eyes turned demonic and he walked up to the two shackled men and slapped them both hard on the nape. Smythe knew this to be a gesture of utter humiliation in Arab culture.

“
Hazokom helw ya welad el metnaka. Awel etnayn fi tareekh el segn da yokhrogo men ghair may footo ala habl el mashna
’
ah! Yakhi aha!
” Beltagi made a snorting pig-like noise called a
shakhra
, loaded once again with culturally-specific insolence that Beltagi must have assumed would have travelled over Smythe
’
s head. This despicable man was unable to resist the pleasure of humiliating the prisoners, even as he told them they
’
d be the first to ever walk out alive.

The faces of the Delta Force guys betrayed exactly how uncomfortable they were by the image of the hoods on the heads of the Jordanians. The memories of the Abu Ghraib prison affair invoked by what they were looking at would surely weigh on their minds.

“Can we remove these hoods, please?” Smythe asked, then glanced at Sobhy to translate. As he expected, Beltagi resisted.

“The warden prefers not to. Especially since these men will be freed. He doesn
’
t want them to see his face or the faces of other senior prison personnel. It
’
s a standard procedure.”

“Tell the warden we
’
ve no other option. My mandate is to take custody of two specific men, and to do that I need to identify them.”

Beltagi seemed to understand the gist of what Smythe had said in English. He pointed at the tips of his fingers to let him know he could just as well fingerprint them.

“It
’
s not going to be enough, Major—tell him that. I have pictures and I need to positively ID them.”

The warden and Sobhy broke out into a heated argument about Smythe
’
s request. But Sobhy didn
’
t let it drag for too long before he lashed at the warden. The orders to assist the Americans had come from the very top, he reminded him. If he wanted to fuck around, he was welcome to, but it would end up costing him dearly.